On the 14th (local time), the United States deployed military assets to the Persian Gulf off Iran's coast, tightening military and financial pressure on Iran. After the provisional agreement the two countries signed last month effectively came to an end, the United States began a full-scale maritime blockade, sending tensions throughout the Persian Gulf region to a peak.
On the 14th, U.S. Central Command resumed a maritime blockade against Iran, completely shutting down the passage of ships traveling to and from Iranian territorial waters and ports as of 4 p.m. that day (Eastern Time, 5 a.m. on the 15th in Korea). At 3 p.m., an hour before the blockade took effect, it also carried out high-intensity airstrikes targeting key southern Iranian locations, including Bushehr and Bandar Abbas. U.S. Central Command said, "We have more than 20 warships and hundreds of operational aircraft deployed in the Middle East, maintaining a ready posture."
Analysts see the resumption of the maritime blockade as reflecting the Donald Trump administration's resolve to choke off funding for Iran's economy, which relies on crude exports for liquidity. Under a memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed with Iran on the 17th of last month, the United States sought to ease tensions by suspending the maritime blockade for about 60 days. But after Iran recently fired a series of cruise missiles at oil tankers and other vessels transiting the southern route of the Strait of Hormuz, causing civilian casualties, President Trump declared the deal void and pivoted to a military response.
Meeting reporters at the White House that day, President Trump blamed Iran for triggering military tensions with a preemptive strike. "They shot first, and that was a big mistake," Trump said. In particular, Trump withdrew within a day his initial plan to impose a 20% toll on ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz and said he would replace it with investment agreements from Gulf allies into the United States.
Iran's government, meanwhile, is sticking to its stance that it will not compromise under U.S. military pressure. Kazem Gharibabadi, Iran's Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs, immediately pushed back through state media the same day, saying the United States first tore up the memorandum of understanding and violated its obligations. Warning that "if the United States believes it can drag Tehran to the negotiating table by reimposing the blockade, that is a clear miscalculation," Vice Minister Gharibabadi signaled a return to the state before the memorandum of understanding and a full-spectrum confrontation.
Middle East experts say resuming the maritime blockade could sever diplomatic channels and prolong physical clashes. In an interview with Al Jazeera, Alex Vatanka, senior fellow at the Middle East Institute, called the U.S. pressure tactics "a kind of gamble," analyzing that "given Iran has responded with sustained retaliatory strikes rather than yielding under pressure, this move carries a high risk of escalating into full-scale war."
In fact, as Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps launches retaliatory drone and missile strikes toward neighboring countries such as Kuwait and Bahrain, where U.S. bases are nearby, signs of paralysis in operations around the Strait of Hormuz, a logistics aorta, are expected to intensify for the time being.